Together We Remember

One year ago today in Atlanta, eight lives were violently taken in three consecutive attacks that targeted Asian businesses. Six of the victims were Asian women. The murders occurred amid a sharp rise in hate crimes against Asian/AAPI people targeting women and the elderly,  the most vulnerable in our society. In the wake of these events, many of us were left with unutterable pain, especially because it was experienced in the isolation of quarantine.

The brutal attacks on Asian/AAPI groups continue. Only a few days ago, an elderly Asian woman in New York City was viciously beaten 125 times in her apartment building.  These aggressions, often unregistered in public consciousness, remind us that the pandemic is only the most recent trigger in a long history of xenophobic violence. Perpetually marked as alien, foreign, and Other, Asians/AAPIs become scapegoats in times of crisis. 

We founded the Asian/ Asian American Pacific Islander Faculty and Staff Caucus at LSU to create a space free from fear to tell our stories, and to bring forth a world where we celebrate our differences together. So let us remember the tragic loss that united us, for togethe we became stronger. Together we fight for each other. Together we fight for ourselves.